DARPA-funded study may lead to building prosthetic limbs for humans using a direct brain-electrode interface to recreate the sense of touch

October 26, 2015

Neuroscientists in a project headed by the University of Chicago have determined some of the specific characteristics of electrical stimuli that should be applied to the brain to produce different sensations in an artificial upper limb intended to restore natural motor control and sensation in amputees.

Rice University catalyst may lead to clean, inexpensive hydrogen production for fuel cells

October 23, 2015

Graphene doped with nitrogen and augmented with cobalt atoms has proven to be an effective, durable catalyst for the production of hydrogen from water, according to scientists at Rice University.

The Rice University lab of chemist James Tour and colleagues has developed a robust, solid-state catalyst that shows promise to replace expensive platinum for hydrogen generation. (Catalysts can split water into its constituent hydrogen and oxygen atoms, a process… read more

October 23, 2015

Carnegie Mellon scientists are creating cutting-edge technology that could one day solve the shortage of heart transplants, which are currently needed to repair damaged organs.

“We’ve been able to take MRI images of coronary arteries and 3-D images of embryonic hearts and 3-D bioprint them with unprecedented resolution and quality out of very soft materials like collagens, alginates and fibrins,” said Adam Feinberg, an… read more

October 23, 2015

In 1939, Russian engineer Boris Ushakov proposed a “flying submarine” — a cool James Bond-style vehicle that could seamlessly transition from air to water and back again. Ever since, engineers have been trying to design one, with little success. The biggest challenge: aerial vehicles require large airfoils like wings or sails to generate lift, while underwater vehicles need to minimize surface area to reduce drag.

October 22, 2015

Mass extinctions occurring over the past 260 million years were likely caused by comet and asteroid showers, scientists conclude in a new study published in an open-access paper in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

For more than 30 years, scientists have argued about a controversial hypothesis relating to periodic mass extinctions and impact craters — caused by comet and asteroid showers — on Earth.

October 22, 2015

Astronomers at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum in Germany have compiled the largest astronomical image to date: a picture of the Milky Way containing 46 billion pixels, viewable here (you can enter an object name, such as “Eta Carinae,” in the lower-left box).

The image was generated over a period of five years of astronomical observations by two telescopes at Bochum’s university observatory in the Atacama Desert… read more

October 21, 2015

A University of Washington (UW) otolaryngology resident and a bioengineering student have used 3-D printing to create a low-cost pediatric rib cartilage model that more closely resembles the feel of real cartilage, which is used in an operation called auricular reconstruction (ear replacement).

The innovation could make it possible for aspiring surgeons to become proficient in the sought-after but challenging procedure. And because the UW… read more

How the mind processes sequential memory may help understand psychiatric disorders

October 21, 2015

Try to remember a phone number. You’re now using “sequential memory,” in which your mind processes a sequence of numbers, events, or ideas. It underlies how people think, perceive, and interact as social beings. To understand how sequential memory works, researchers have built mathematical models that mimic this process.

Cognitive modes

Taking this a step further, Mikhail Rabinovich, a physicist and neurocognitive scientist at the University of California,… read more

Replaces the existing expensive and complex process needed when synthesizing new chemicals --- could revolutionize pharmaceutical and biomaterials manufacturing

October 21, 2015

Colorado State University chemists have invented a single chemical reaction that couples two constituent chemicals into a carbon-carbon bond, while simultaneously introducing a nitrogen component. The process promises to replace a multi-step, expensive, and complex process needed when synthesizing new chemicals — for drug creation and testing, for example.

The researchers were able to control this reaction to make the nitrogen atoms go exactly where they want them to,… read more

October 20, 2015

When our solar system was born 4.6 billion years ago, only eight percent of the potentially habitable planets that will ever form in the universe existed, according to an assessment of data collected by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope and Kepler space observatory and published today (Oct. 20) in an open-access paper in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

October 20, 2015

Researchers from Oxford and Stony Brook universities has found a way to precisely control the electrical waves that regulate the rhythm of our heartbeat — using light. Their results are published in the journal Nature Photonics.

Cardiac cells in the heart and neurons in the brain communicate by electrical signals, and these messages of communication travel fast from cell to cell as “excitation waves.”… read more

October 20, 2015

A new system that may allow people to detect pesticides cheaply and rapidly, combining a paper sensor and an Android program on a smartphone, has been developed by researchers in China and Singapore, according to a new study published in Biosensors and Bioelectronics.

As the potential effects of pesticides on health become clearer, it is increasingly important to be able to detect them in the environment… read more

October 19, 2015

Scientists from the University of Colorado are developing a new type of “rectenna” to efficiently “harvest” thermal emissions (waste heat) radiated from devices (a rectenna converts electromagnetic radiation to DC current).

Currently rectennas work best at low frequencies, but most heat is at higher radiation frequencies — up to the 100 THz (100 trillion cycles per second) range. So Won Park and his… read more

October 19, 2015

MIT engineers have achieved a significant efficiency boost in a light-harvesting system, using genetically engineered viruses to achieve higher efficiency in transporting energy from receptors to reaction centers where it can be harnessed, making use of the exotic effects of quantum mechanics. Emulating photosynthesis in nature, it could lead to inexpensive and efficient solar cells or light-driven catalysis,

This achievement in coupling quantum research and genetic manipulation,… read more

October 19, 2015

Cornell University engineers have developed a process for 3D-printing a soft robotic tentacle that mimics the complex movements and degree of freedom of an octopus tentacle.

The tentacle achieves its dexterity through a 3-dimensional arrangement of muscles in three mutually perpendicular directions (longitudinal, transverse and helical). The process uses an elastomeric (both elastic and flows) material combined with a low-cost, reliable, and simple method for… read more